Living on a preserve/rodents
 

Question....do you think living on a preserve you would be more apt to have rodents? What is your experience?

depends on what's competing in a specific food chain

Mamalea
 

We've lived on a preserve for 4 years -- have never seen a rodent. (and I hope that doesn't change!!!)

Of course there will be rodents of various kinds in the preserve and they will come into your yard. You may not ever see them, but they will be there. There will also be larger things keeping them in check like snakes, coyotes, and feral cats. Once again, you may never see them, but they are there.

We live on a preserve. No bird feeders, no composte, no fruit trees and a bait box or two and you will be fine. Also know that rats live in the leaves of palm trees. We have not had a problem but they like to hang out there. Your interior neighbors will have more problems because rats like to climb walls and multiply. If everyone is cautious as I have mentioned, you should be relatively ok. Rats are around The Villages, I have had detailed discussion with Property Management on this issue to increase my knowledge on the topic. Practice common sense and don't make your yard an Open House for them, so to speak, with everything they like. Oh, one more thing, clean up dog feces, rats like that as well so pick up every day....you asked!

After talking to people living in Florida for a long time, we decided not to have palm trees or fruit trees in our yard.

Palm Rats | Pest Library | Catseye Pest Control

Good advice. Thank you all.

Living on a Preserve. Have Palm trees and Orange tree. Palm trees were installed as our initial landscape when house built, next door planted many palm trees. We have never seen a rodent. Only varmints we seem to have are the Geico salesman and ants. May depend on which preserve.

Great advice! I knew about that fruit trees,dog feces and bird feeders, but wasn't aware of the Palm Tree problem. YUK!

Just One Bite problem solved.

But Gracie, they are so good deep fried! Be sure to use Panko crumbs.

We back on a space that is zoned as "open space environmental".
We have a little family of small snakes living unobtrusively at the side of the house.
The Pest Control people said "leave snakes alone, they are good for controlling rodents".
We have never seen a rodent so I guess that's true.

BOY HOWDY Steve!!!!

Now this discussion ruined my day Should have known the discussion was going to go beyond preserves:sigh:

Rats also love for you to put your trash out early.

I'm not a great fan of snakes either, BUT would rather have them than rats for sure!

I sure do pity our future neighbors in TV, whoever they turn out to be. Once we move there & get settled in I'll be planting mass quantities of various PALMS, big & small. Oh no, RATS galore!!

Believe me, that's only an old wives tale, nothing more. Unless you allow a huge "skirt" of many, many dead fronds (leaves) to collect & remain at the top of your tree, you will NOT have a family of rats move in & take up residence.

Never had that problem. I put my trash out around 5 PM the day before collection.

I've heard numerous pigs near our home in Lake Deaton, especially on the Southeast end of the neighborhood. We walked into a new construction a couple weeks ago and across the pond was a large one. Probably 140+ lbs. This was around dusk. They will tear you up. Y'all be careful out there.

Someone told me years ago, that birds were always able to find adequate food and water in Florida without folks putting out bird feeders. His point was that the seeds that dropped to ground along with fruit that falls from trees are enjoyed by rodents. The more rodents around, the more snakes show up. Also said that these big clumps of Pampas Grass are natural nesting places for a variety of rodents especially if they are near a food supply.

One of the golf course maintenance staff told me snakes love Pampas grass.

We live on a preserve. There are 160 open acres behind our house. I put up a game camera a couple of years ago. The camera captured images of coyotes, bobcats, raccoons, opossums, rabbits, and feral cats.

There is a pack of coyotes that live in the preserve. When the coyotes hear the emergency response vehicle sirens they all howl. It's a pretty neat sound. We have seen coyotes in mid-day.

We've seen gators, frogs, snakes (non-poisonous...so far), and some pretty big spiders, but no rats. Oh, and 54 species of birds so far.

I'm not crazy about the spiders, and the snakes startle me sometimes, but we love living on the preserve.